“It’s a mentality, it’s how I’m going to approach the game. And the team has worked hard in supporting me to accomplish these minor tweaks in my game.”

That Cooke classifies his issues as “minor tweaks” makes you wonder how much he really sees the error of his actions. The Penguins goon who pretty much started Savard’ on the path to an early end to his career with a cheap shot in March 2010 hasn’t played in the NHL since this March because of an elbow to the head of New York Rangers youngster Ryan McDonagh that cost Cooke a suspension for the rest of the regular season and playoffs.

Actions, or in Cooke’s case non-actions, will speak louder than words. We’ll see if the punishment he received from the league, plus the fact that his teammate Sidney Crosby has missed an extended period of time with a head injury, actually changes Cooke. The safety of everyone in the NHL is depending on it.

Cooke is a joke. He said the same thing after he boarded the Columbus player from behind about how he needs to change and he supposedly met with Mario about his play. This guy won’t change. Either the league has to do something aka kick him out of the league or someone someday is going to do something to him to make sure he won’t play in the league again.

I see this at the very least as a way to pacify elements within the Pittsburgh fanbase that actually know hockey and realize how dirty/dangerous Cooke is so that they don’t spread their correct view to the more casual “bandwagoners” who will likely be out in force this year in Pitt. I say this because every time Pittsburgh is on the receiving end of a hit, they whine louder that a two-year old, but when they give those hits they shrug it off as a hockey play or denounce the player after the suspension (i.e. when their actions are really meaningless anyway). Strangely, Montreal saw what they thought was a dirty hit from Pouloit (and I agree) and pulled him from the next game, which may have been motivated by other factors, but was what one hopes an organization would do.

Pound sand Cooke. We’ll see, but I don’t see him changing a thing. Once a headhunter, always a headhunter. Dude lacks the cognitive ability to alter his path and point of contact in the split second it can take for a hit to be clean or dirty. I hope for the safety of other players that he does, but I just don’t see it happening.